Submit Applications for UK Acumen Fellowship Program (UK)

Acumen invests in social entrepreneurs across the capital continuum and accompanies them on the journey to create transformational change. At Acumen Academy, they identify and prepare these leaders with the hard skills required to build scalable solutions to poverty and the harder skills of moral leadership to re-imagine and build a better world.

Program Details

• About the Fellowship
  • Their program is grounded in two decades of experience accompanying social entrepreneurs on the journey from seed to scale. The Fellowship provides new leadership frameworks and through a supportive cohort, Fellows pressure test the new skills they’re learning in real time, and build peer relationships that keep them accountable to their values and commitments as they grow and scale their impact.
• Curriculum
  • Polarity Management
    • Learn to operate in a world of opposing views and to cross lines of difference to mobilise others towards a shared cause or problem.
  • Good Society Readings
    • Explore the meaning of a just society and the moral and historical foundation of social change through classic and contemporary texts by thinkers such as Plato, Ursula K. LeGuin, Chimamanda Adichie, Dr. Martin Luther King, and Amartya Sen.
  • Adaptive Leadership
    • Learn to understand stakeholders, map their needs, and navigate uncertainty to catalyse change.
  • Authentic Voice
    • Learn to tell stories that compel and inspire others to take action in pursuit of a bold idea. Build audience awareness to improve your pitch, talk to investors, form partnerships, and make connections.
• Structure
  • Fellows remain in their jobs and participate in a 8-month hybrid program consisting of virtual sessions, in-person immersives, and self-paced learning.
  • This is a high-level program overview:
    • Three 4-day full-time in-person immersives (held at different locations in the UK; 4 hours of assignments for each immersive).
    • Two 5-week long virtual workshop series (4 hours of assignments each week consisting of self-paced learning, facilitated sessions and group calls).

Benefits

• Upon completion of the program, participants join the Foundry, their global community of 1600+ alumni from around the world. They help Foundry members build and scale organisations through access to these selective opportunities:
  • Tools and Mentorship
    • Get specialised tools and exclusive coaching opportunities from their partners at Bain and Company.
  • Community
    • Join a community of award-winning social entrepreneurs.
  • Amplification
    • Get exposure to a global audience of investors, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders.
  • Early-stage funding
    • Pitch for early-stage catalytic capital through Acumen Angels to go from seed to scale.

Eligibility Criteria

• You are a social entrepreneur or senior decision-maker solving problems of poverty.
• You have 5 years of work experience (minimum) and are able to demonstrate commitment towards solving issues of poverty. On average their Fellows have 10-15 years of work experience with 10 years working on problems of poverty.
• You have a reliable internet connection and will be fully available to participate throughout the entirety of the program.
• You must be over the age of 18 to apply for the Fellowship.
• There are no specific academic prerequisites.
• All sessions and training are conducted in English, with the exception of the Colombia and Spain programs, which are offered in Spanish. To give and receive most from the experience, proficiency in the language is a requirement.

For more information, visit Acumen Academy.